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Her eyes widen as I open the box, revealing not a diamond as most women might expect, but a signet ring matching the one I sacrificed along with my finger.

"I don't want to own you anymore, Francesca," I tell her, voice steady despite the precipice I stand upon. "I want to rule with you."

I remove the ring from its velvet nest, holding it between us like an offering.

"Blood will have blood. That's the tradition. The Ravelli way." I extend my hand, palm up. "Francesca, will you bind your blood to mine? Not as captive to captor, but now as queen to king?"

She studies me, searching for deception, for manipulation, for the games that have defined our world.

"You'll never be free of the monster," I warn, needing her to understand completely. "The darkness Vito cultivated, that I perfected… it remains. Will always remain."

"I know," she replies, stepping closer until her body nearly touches mine. "And I'm no longer the innocent you imagine. I've watched you kill without remorse. Have felt your violence.Cravedmore. Perhaps I've always been a monster too, just one that was waiting for permission to emerge."

She extends her hand, wrist up, offering me access to her pulse, her lifeblood. "Claim me."

I reach for the display case holding my first trophy knife. The blade catches light as I press it gently against her offered skin.

"Once done, there's no return," I warn, meeting her gaze. "The blood oath binds us completely."

"Do it," she commands, queen already in everything but title.

The blade slides against her skin, drawing a thin crimson line across her palm. She doesn't flinch, doesn't hesitate as blood wells from the precise cut.

I make a matching incision across my own palm, deeper than necessary, pain a welcome clarity as our blood mingles.

"Blood to blood," I intone, the ancient words rising from memory as our hands press together. "Life to life. Power shared, never divided. Ravelli by name, Ravelli by blood."

"Strength in unity," she continues, somehow knowing the script without being taught. "Loyalty… until death."

Our joined hands form a seal, blood continuing to flow between us, binding us more completely than any legal document or church ceremony could achieve.

I slide the ring onto her finger, the metal still warm from my touch. "No longer Castellano. Now Ravelli in blood and bond."

Her palm remains pressed to mine, our mingled blood sealing the transformation from captive to queen.

"My monster," she whispers, free hand reaching up to trace my jaw. "My king."

"My salvation," I admit, the word torn from somewhere I've kept buried since childhood. "My queen."

I claim her mouth with mine, tasting her surrender and triumph in equal measure. Her body arches into me, blood stillwarm between our joined hands as my free arm circles her waist, pulling her flush against me.

The kiss deepens, becomes something primal and possessive. I back her against the display case, lifting her onto its edge, weapons and trophies surrounding us as I push her dress up her thighs.

She spreads her legs in invitation, our bloody hands still pressed together as my mouth trails down her throat. I taste salt and sweetness, her pulse racing beneath my tongue as I descend to her breasts, teasing through the thin fabric of her dress.

"I need to taste all of you," I growl against her skin.

I drop to my knees before her, the position not one of submission but of worship. My bloody hand finally releases hers to grip her thigh, pushing her legs wider as I move between them with a fierce growl.

I push her dress higher, revealing black lace already damp with evidence of her desire.

"Mine," I murmur against her inner thigh, where my mark remains etched into her flesh. "Always mine."

"Yes," she gasps, hands tangling in my hair as I tear the lace barrier aside with impatient fingers.

The first stroke of my tongue against her core draws a desperate moan from her lips. She tastes like power and surrender, like everything I've hunted my entire life.

I devour her with the same brutal focus I bring to violence, to strategy, to conquest. My tongue circles her clit before dipping inside, gathering her wetness, feeling her thighs tremble around my head.